Despite high expectations and carefully crafted safeguards, our current system of public guardianship is broken. Procedural and jurisdictional defects compound mismanagement, understaffing, poor decision-making, and inadequate care. Instead of protecting the elderly, the numerous officials and agencies charged with accountability and oversight of the public guardianship programs cover up the sad fact that, in many cases, these programs do more harm than good.
Source:
Virginians for Guardianship Reform
6 comments:
The system is broken in Illinois too. The county I live in, Winnebago County (Rockford, Illinois) has had and continues to have many transgressions borne against innocent seniors who are placed into guardianship for dubious reasons. Their estates have been raided, their families distraught and the Public Guardian and court-appointed guardians and guardians ad litem rake in exorbitant fees for minimal work. There is real guardianship abuse going on here and many people are working to expose and fight it. Good luck Virginia! Save Our Seniors!
Good website!
Thank you for posting this resource.
Not only that, but in Virginia, even the sole remaining family member cannot file with the Human Rights nor Health Professionals on the abuse/neglect of their loved one as the guardian (even if in a different state) has full jurisdiction over their ward, even when it is not in the best interests of them or the family member. We certainly need major reforms on all levels.
Thanks for posting this link!
Today we attended a Virginia CLE on guardianship, and GUESS WHAT?!
The incapacitated person has a right to attend the hearing, even if the hand-picked guardian ad litem and the unethical public guardianship program don't want the incapacitated person to come to court!
The incapacitated person has a right to representation by an attorney of his or her choice! It's true! There's a right to an attorney!
The incapacitated person has a right to testify, and to the LEAST RESTRICTIVE ALTERNATIVE, which in many cases is something other than guardianship, or something other than public guardianship, which, it turns out, is the MOST RESTRICTIVE alternative!
Institutional petitioners such as social services agencies and hospitals, and public guardianaship programs like Jewish Family Service of Tidewater and Catholic Charities of Eastern Virginia CANNOT hand-pick the guardian ad litem "for" the incapacitated person! (You know, the GAL who always agrees with them, no matter how badly they mistreat the GAL's "client," the incapacitated person.) Turns out, that's a blatant conflict of interest!
Of course, we already knew all that, because we have read the law.
Now if only the tiny handful of unethical lawyers who petition for and represent these public guardianship programs, and the unethical hand-picked guardian ad litem "for" incapacitated people, who handles hundreds and hundreds of cases and doesn't think it's a problem for her "client" to live in a place with rats and mice and bedbugs and far worse, would take the trouble familiarize themselves with the law.
If only the judges would look behind the false rosy picture that JFS, CCEVA, and the Virginia Department for Aging and Rehabilitative Services paint, investigate and learn the truth about these public guardianship programs. Many innocent, vulnerable people are being seriously mistreated. Public funds are being wasted on subhuman conditions, while unethical lawyers collect fat, unearned paychecks.
VfGR
We've heard about those rights in other states, but they are not protected. Courts do as they will!
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